STR characteristic overwhelming?

[Kinslayer]

Hello everyone,

We are starting a new/first Conan campaign though I've had the rulebook for some time, and in creating characters, it seems like I should advise my players to bid STR even more than others as it not only adds to offence but defence (PARRY Bonus).

In addition, it seems that BAB outpaces DV most times, so being able to land a blow and hit hard brings the sudden death threshold a lot quicker at mid levels (10-12).

I wonder if anyone has played w/ increasing that threshold for characters above 10th level? A decent fighter type w/ power attack and a two handed weapon could force a sudden death w/ an average hit?
It also seems cheap for monsters and large animals?

For GMs, how often do your characters die in Conan campaign?
vs. regular d&d (almost never for me or rather almost never permanently thanks to resurrection spells).

Sorry for these musings; like I said I've had the book for a while playing out scenarios in my head. I suppose I'll see how it turns out on the table.
I am more than excited!

 

[VincentDarlage]

For GMs, how often do your characters die in Conan campaign?
vs. regular d&d (almost never for me or rather almost never permanently thanks to resurrection spells).

About the same now. The players learned to pick and choose their fights and to use more strategy to make sure they win before they get into the fight than they did in DnD. They know it is more dangerous, so they make sure the battlefield is in their favour (whenever possible, at least) before engaging.

 

[Yogah of Yag]

Hello everyone,

We are starting a new/first Conan campaign though I've had the rulebook for some time, and in creating characters, it seems like I should advise my players to bid STR even more than others as it not only adds to offence but defence (PARRY Bonus).

In addition, it seems that BAB outpaces DV most times, so being able to land a blow and hit hard brings the sudden death threshold a lot quicker at mid levels (10-12).

I wonder if anyone has played w/ increasing that threshold for characters above 10th level? A decent fighter type w/ power attack and a two handed weapon could force a sudden death w/ an average hit?
It also seems cheap for monsters and large animals?

For GMs, how often do your characters die in Conan campaign?
vs. regular d&d (almost never for me or rather almost never permanently thanks to resurrection spells).

Sorry for these musings; like I said I've had the book for a while playing out scenarios in my head. I suppose I'll see how it turns out on the table.
I am more than excited!

Welcome to the boards!
To answer the question of how often the PCs die....They drop like puny, little, insignificant flies. :twisted:
Hyboria is a rough place to be. As a GM I give them no quarter, no mercy, no hand-holding, and that's the way (IMHO) it should be. They may gripe when a carefully statted PC is wasted, but that teaches them to be stronger and better the next time.

 

[urdinaran]

My group recently hit 4th level and that adventure was the first that a PC died; due to a failed Massive Damage save.

As for the STR issue, don't worry about it. DR of armor helps compensate for that, and a large shield adds +4 to parry, kinda offsetting STR.

 

[Netherek]

Don't forget that you have to dodge missiles and touch attacks. If you use some optional rules for parrying like weapon break and length, there are other negatives for parrying.

 

[argo]

Hello everyone,

We are starting a new/first Conan campaign though I've had the rulebook for some time, and in creating characters, it seems like I should advise my players to bid STR even more than others as it not only adds to offence but defence (PARRY Bonus).

True. But because they also revamped finesse fighting you can now also use your Dex for both offense and defense, no feat required. On top of that Dex still affects ranged attacks (cant use Str for that), you can't parry ranged attacks/touch attacks, Dex still adds to both Ref saves and Initative (Str doesn't affect any save and just look at any of the Sneak Attack threads to see how dangerous it is to loose init in Conan) and Dex still affects a wide variety of important skills.

Sure, if what you want is a character who can force a massive damage save at will then Str is a good choice, but its not overwhelming.

IME the stat to recieve the single greatest increase in value as compared to dnd is Int. As soon as my players realized that bonus skill points from a high Int can be spent on any skill as a class skill .... Hoo-boy but I've never had such a smart group of PC's :roll:

I wonder if anyone has played w/ increasing that threshold for characters above 10th level? A decent fighter type w/ power attack and a two handed weapon could force a sudden death w/ an average hit?
It also seems cheap for monsters and large animals?

To be honest ... thats kinda the point. Conan is supposed to be a deadly game. And as for character death ... thats what fate points are for :wink:

 

[Kinslayer]

These are many good points about the values;
I had never thought that Int. would rise in value, but I can see how it's even more important b/c skills are emphasized much more.
Someone in another post mentioned the varied linguistic skills; I think that's great too; often times, there's one guy that plays the Face for the party; has a decent CHA score... but in Conan, your Hyrkanian nomad who smells of horsemettle may have to be the one to talk to Turanian nobleman on your friend's behalf!

Overall, it's the grittiness and feel of the game that really captivates me; I think Mongoose did a great job of matching the rules to the setting.
In a way also it reminds me of how I felt when I first read that basic red d&D book many years ago; remember the fighter (kind of looked like a Conan) who met a cleric, and then fought against a wizard...

We should have 3-4 players; my ambitious plan is to have them create 1 char. each plus an NPC; we'll have 1 group of PCs and 1 group of NPCs kind of working together but the NPCs separately offstage. And when someone dies, they can move into another character(after a suitable period of morning.)